


The Crew

by LikeMuh_Fashnik



Category: Leverage
Genre: Description Light, Dialogue Heavy, Gen, Heist, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-15
Updated: 2020-06-15
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:40:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24741706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LikeMuh_Fashnik/pseuds/LikeMuh_Fashnik
Summary: Olivia Sterling is gonna need a team.
Comments: 14
Kudos: 38





	The Crew

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by this post: https://streakedfacon.tumblr.com/post/123186927796/leverage-the-next-generation-molly-following
> 
> Though I did not use their details or backstory, I did use the idea of these five being Leverage TNG.
> 
> I own nothing and no one, please don't sue. This story is un-beta'd, and my first foray into publishing fanfic. I'm happy to hear constructive criticism so long as it's constructive.
> 
> *The character of Josie did not have a last name that I could find on IMDB, so I made up the last name Andrews. If anyone has any better information on a canon last name, feel free to let me know.
> 
> **Update: User heartsinger informs me that the transcripts list Josie's last name as Marvin, so no need for me to invent a last name. Thank you heartsinger.

_What she needed was a team._

Olivia Sterling had been staring at the file open in front of her for close to an hour. Her eyes had gone gritty and her mouth was bone dry. 

A team was the only way this was gonna work. She’d gone over every angle, considered every legal avenue. 

Ever since her supervisor at the FBI’s Chicago field office had shown her the file room, this case had been on a constant loop in the back of her mind. 

In those early days at her job, she’d worked her way through all the information on the active cases, reporting her thoughts, conclusions, and next steps to the SAC who’d assigned her to review the files. Of course, he’d simply nodded his head and said “Yeah, that’s what we ended up doing.” An informal training exercise of sorts. 

But this case. This case. 

The trouble was, everything the medical supply company had done so far was perfectly legal. It was legal to own an LLC, it was legal to pay state safety inspectors to do “consulting work” for those LLCs, and it was legal to staff your legal department with lawyers who’d lead to favorable rulings in the past, no matter who they were working for at the time. 

The real trouble was, when you added all that up, it amounted to millions of dollars of bribes, faulty medical equipment on the market, and a death rate close to double what was to be expected. 

_That was one part of the magic formula in getting away with something like this,_ Olivia thought. People who needed the dialysis machines, pace makers, and glucose pumps that Cullen Technologies sold had the kinds of conditions that killed people, so when they eventually died, the kinds of lawyers their families could afford had a hell of a time establishing the connection between Cullen and the patient’s death. 

But Olivia had been able to access many, many insurance cases through her father’s old connections. 

Other companies did not have death rates that even approached Cullen Technologies’ numbers. When all the other pieces were held constant, it came down to their faulty equipment. 

Their facilities across the country were sub-standard, multiple employees had been “let go for poor performance” after reporting factory conditions to regulatory boards, and it looked as though every single person who could be bribed had been bribed. 

She was gonna need a team – and man, did she hate phrasing it that way. Her father’s stories about “the team” - and it was only ever the one team, her step-mother's ex-husband's team, her father’s former friend’s team – had always sounded so preposterous. And self-important, but that was just how her dad talked. 

_Would he still have those files?_ Olivia knew that at one time, Jim Sterling had had a whole file cabinet dedicated to Nate Ford’s team, taken from a pair of men who’d done their homework in an attempt to bring them down. This was after most of them officially died, the year after they’d helped her get out of Dubai, though her father had been absolutely sure they were still alive. He’d never shared why he was so sure, of course. 

_It was too late to call now,_ Olivia thought to herself. _I’ll have to come up with a reason to come over, dinner or something._ Not that her father and step-mother wouldn’t see straight through any attempt she made to hide her real reason for requesting a visit. She was close to them, but they had never been “Sunday dinner with the family” kind of people. She’d simply have to ask to see the files, and ask for a little trust and a little time before she explained her reasons. Her dad had once asked her to inform on her step-father; he could trust her to look at decade-old records he kept in his own house. 

*** *** *** *** *** 

_Wait a minute; she’d seen that name before._ Olivia had been knee-deep in her dad’s Ford files for a good chunk of the afternoon. The direct approach had served her well – her father had agreed to let her see the files after her step-mother had prompted him to extract a promise of more frequent visits in exchange. This worked out perfectly for all parties involved, as Olivia only needed to carry a few boxes at a time out to her car. 

She was halfway through the Boston years when she saw a name she could have sworn she recognized. Josie Marvin. Her dad’s files described her as a former teenaged car thief who’d gone mostly legit since her encounter with Ford’s crew all those years ago. The records suggested she might’ve stayed in the game, but she’d never been caught or arrested. 

_But why was that name ringing a bell?_ Olivia knew that if she tried too hard to find the connection, she never would, so she tried to let her mind go blank, let the information she needed float to the top. 

Prince Security! That was it – the security consultant firm she’d dealt with a few cases ago. It was a national franchise, with a few offices scattered about the country, so she’d never met the woman, but she had seen her name on a list of employees. The firm specialized in using “red teams” to test their clients’ security by having their own people try to break in. 

It looked like Olivia had found the first member of her crew. 

*** *** *** *** *** 

“Josie Marvin?” Olivia called out to the shorter brunette hunched over what looked like the pieces of a safe. 

The woman seated at the over-crowded workspace looked up, eyebrows drawn down in suspicion and confusion. 

“I guess that depends on who’s asking, and why.” 

_Well, that’s fair,_ she thought. 

“My name is Olivia Sterling. I came to talk to you about a job offer, of sorts. Can I buy you a cup of coffee, talk it over?” 

Josie had been around long enough to read between the lines. This short, blonde woman, about her age, was approaching her about a “job” of the less-than-legal persuasion. 

As she took a moment to think, she let the silence grow longer and longer to see how this Olivia Sterling reacted. She looked down and kept practicing on her client’s safe mechanism. 

Josie hadn’t committed an actual crime in years now. After some timely intervention by the crazy-awesome Parker, Josie had gone to work in landscaping. She’d learned a lot, including a surprising amount about demolition, but it ultimately just hadn’t satisfied the way that cars had. 

She'd found a different crew, one less likely to chew her up and spit her out, and they'd had a few good years together. She’d learned most every part of thieving there was, and none of them had ever turned on each other. It was when three of their group had been picked up on unrelated charges within a few months of each other that Josie had decided it was time to go legit. She’d jumped at the chance to use her skills with Prince Security's red team, but she'd been a touch restless the last little while. 

The mechanism clicked open. _Not my best time, but not the worst._ Josie looked up at Olivia Sterling to see she hadn't left, or even lost that calm, polite expression she came in with. That cinched it. 

She stood up and brushed her hands off. 

“I’ll take a cappuccino the size of my head if you're buying,” Josie called out as she made her way to the door. 

*** *** *** *** *** 

It occurred to Olivia that, if one person that Ford's crew interacted with later got in the game, on one side of the law or the other, it stood to reason that there might be more. She'd originally sought these files out to help with her planning, but this was even better. She set the Marvin file off to the side for safekeeping and turned back to the pile in front of her. _Had she missed anyone?_ She decided to keep reading, see if any more names stood out, but then double back with a sharper eye for anyone who might have gotten into crime _after_ dealing with the Leverage Consulting & Associates crew. 

*** *** *** *** *** 

“Molly Connell?” 

The woman Olivia recognized from a photo of her younger self didn't rise from her position holding a man a head taller than her in an armbar. He was starting to make some distressing noises. 

“Just give me a sec!” she called out brightly. She maintained the armbar a few more seconds, then released when the man began to tap out. They both rose to their feet. 

“Ok, you did a much better job fending me off than last time. We’ll have to keep working on getting out of holds. Go take a water break.” 

Molly turned her way when Olivia offered out an oversized bottle of water in her direction. 

“What's up?” Molly asked as she gratefully accepted the water and began to take small sips. 

“My name is Olivia Sterling. I came to talk about a job offer, of sorts. Do you have a few minutes?” 

“I’m just fine in the job I have now,” Molly replied. “Besides, I’ve got another lesson after I get done with this one.” 

“This would be more of a …” Olivia trailed off, “side project. You do good work with Prince; this wouldn't require you to stop. Please, at least let me explain a little bit more when you've got a break.” 

Molly paused from where she had started to walk off. She looked at Olivia, really looked at her for the first time. She seemed calm on the surface, but underneath Molly could tell that this was really important to her. 

She'd gotten into a good rhythm here at Prince Security. After she'd been briefly and terrifyingly kidnapped when she was a teenager, Molly had studied every form of self-defense she could. Between that, her mother's death, and her dad's hyper-focus on work, it had led to more than her fair share of scrapes and bar fights, a few minor arrests, but she'd gotten back on track a few years ago, and had been teaching the uber-rich and their families how to protect themselves from abduction ever since. The company had been good about her arrest record, since it mostly led to fines and court-ordered anger management. 

The blonde in front of her looked like a woman who needed help. It couldn't hurt to hear her out. She had the free time, and who couldn't use a little extra cash. 

*** *** *** *** *** 

_Trevor Dawson was going to be a tricky one,_ Olivia thought as she approached his desk, isolated a little ways from the others in the cubicle farm. 

He’d been living his life mostly above board. He worked in IT, but seemed to think of it as his “day job.” He’d never been big on authority figures, even before meeting Ford’s crew, and he trusted them even less afterwards. Trevor spent his off hours gaining access to computer systems he had no business accessing, and then leaking out information about the kinds of shady goings-on that major corporations got up to. Olivia didn't think he'd ever seen a dollar from his efforts; he just genuinely believed that information wanted to be free. 

He seemed like the kind of person to jump on something like this, except he didn't know her. Her offer to join her team might come across as a trap. She'd have to approach him in just the right way. 

“Olivia Sterling, right? And you're here with a job offer?” The young man looked up from his computer with a bright smile before she'd even fully made her approach. 

“And you even brought me my favorite, I'm touched.” He took the Dr Pepper out of her hands before she'd even stretched them out to offer him the drink. 

Olivia sat down slowly in the second chair within Trevor's cubicle. 

“So, if you know who I am and why I'm here, I take it you also know whether you're taking the job or not?” There was no reason to beat around the bush now. 

“Oh, I'm definitely in. These people at Cullen are exactly the kind of dicks who need to be taken down a peg.” Olivia was still somehow surprised by exactly how much he knew about her plans. “I just have one condition.” 

“What would that be?” she huffed and gave him an exasperated eyebrow raise. 

“You're buying all the snacks.” 

*** *** *** *** *** 

And then there was one. 

Olivia’s search through her father's files had proved fruitful - she’d found her thief, hitter, and hacker. It was the final slot, the role of grifter, she was having trouble with. 

_How do I find a good liar by looking through paperwork?_ The stacks of files had gotten overwhelming, threatening to tip over whenever she turned around. 

Wait a minute. There was something there. Something Sophie Devereaux had said a time or two about acting - something about how it was about sharing a bit of yourself so the audience felt it was true. 

Olivia didn't need to start with a professional con man. What she needed was an actor. 

*** *** *** *** *** 

It had taken her some time to hunt down Widmark Fowler. For one thing, he had taken to going by Mark at auditions and the like. He also had almost no online presence and was getting paid under the table at all three of his part time jobs. In between all that, he was attending auditions what seemed like eight days a week. Olivia did not envy his sleep schedule. 

She'd come all this way, and she still didn't know quite what to say to him. As far as she could tell, he hadn't committed a crime in his life. How was she going to get him to start off with a con of a multimillion dollar company? She had to speak with him honestly, or this was never going to work. 

She approached the tall, curly haired young man as he stepped away from the food truck with his lunch. 

“Widmark Fowler, my name is Olivia Sterling. I came to talk about a job offer.” 

His face lit up. 

“Is this about that TV spot?” he asked hopefully. “Or the ensemble for the travel company?” 

Olivia shook her head and watched Widmark’s face fall a little, then try to maintain a blank, professional appearance. 

“If you’ve got the time now, there are some benches across the way; I can explain while you eat.” She gestured to the park benches and then started walking, knowing his curious nature would ensure he followed. 

He didn’t disappoint, trailing a few steps after her, likely hoping she had some sort of a role for him. 

And she did, in a way. 

“I’m just gonna jump right in,” Olivia huffed out a breath. “Do you remember when you were ten, your step-dad was arrested, and then caught trying to flee the country while you sang in something called a science-ical?” 

His jaw dropped open and his sandwich nearly tumbled to the pavement. Olivia caught it for him and gave him a moment. 

“Who the fuck are you?” Widmark asked in an angry hiss. “What do you want?” 

“I want to offer you a job. Do you remember the teacher who organized the whole thing? She inspired you to become a performer, didn’t she?” 

Olivia’s calm tone and calling on a familiar point of reference were starting to have an effect on Widmark. His breathing had settled, and he no longer seemed quite so apoplectic. 

“What about it?” 

“Did you know that woman was a con artist? That she and her team made sure your step-dad got caught?” 

Widmark hesitated, still unsure if he could trust this woman who already knew so much about him. 

“I knew that … that something was obviously going on, and she was a part of it. But she helped me, she was nice to me, and my step-dad was a dick even before we knew he was a criminal. Why are you here bringing up all this now?” His tone had gotten sharper there at the end. 

Olivia took one last deep breath. This was it. In a minute, she’d know if any of the plans she’d made were worth a damn. 

“I’m reminding you of a positive example of a con artist, so I can offer you a job as a con artist.” 

Widmark didn’t say anything for a moment, just held her gaze. 

“Is this some kind of a joke?” He sounded like that was exactly what he hoped it was. 

“No, it’s not a joke. I’m putting together a team to take on some really bad guys, and I want you on it. I’ve seen you, you’re really good. I just want you to use those skills to separate some rich, corrupt, negligent-homicide-committing assholes from their money. And possibly their liberty, but one thing at a time.” 

He sat and thought, perfectly still, staring into the middle distance. 

“Negligent homicide?” he asked, in a small voice. 

_That’s it. I’ve got him,_ Olivia thought to herself. She gave him a small smile, resisting the urge to shout her victory to the sky. 

“Yeah. Because of these guys and their shady dealings, a number of people have already died, and others are going to if they’re allowed to keep doing what they’re doing.” She tried not to paint them as the evil empire, although she believed they were, because she didn’t want him to take it for manipulative hyperbole. 

“You know I’m an actor, right?” he replied. “You give me a script, I can work with that, but I’ve never tried anything even close to this before.” 

Olivia smiled. He was in. 

“Think of it like improvisational character work, Widmark.” She pulled out the business cards she’d made up just for this endeavor, handing him one. “Come to this address at ten o’clock Monday morning. You can meet the rest of the team.” 

He reached out slowly and took the card. 

As she rose and walked away, he called out one more time behind her. 

“You know, I usually just go by Mark nowadays.” 

*** *** *** *** *** 

Trevor was having the absolute best day. Ever since the week before last, when Olivia Sterling had stopped trying to be sneaky in her online research of him and actually come to him in person, he’d been waiting for this moment. 

He’d crawled through absolutely everything he could get his hands on about Cullen Technologies. And he could get his hands on a lot more than anyone at that company would be remotely comfortable with. 

He’d dug into all their shady financials, every technically-legal “consulting position,” also known as bribes … every death. These guys really did need to be taken to task, for every person who died due to their faulty equipment, and for their own workers stuck in wildly unsafe factory conditions. 

But today was finally the day. Cullen Technologies didn’t know it yet, but today was the beginning of the end for them. 

The reason Trevor was so excited was that not only was he going to get to be a part of that imminent destruction, he was going to be part of a team! Today, he got to deliver his carefully prepared briefing, and meet his future partners in crime. 

He’d even done a little research on them all and brought their favorite drinks, even though Sterling had assured him she’d keep her promise to provide all the snacks. Trevor had always believed there was no faster way to make friends than breaking bread with people. 

He knocked on the door of the apartment from the business card Olivia Sterling had given him at the end of their introduction. He heard a voice call him inside and opened the door to an open living room/kitchen that had been reorganized to accommodate a large table and a few computer screens, set up in the style of a conference room. 

“Trevor, you’re here,” Sterling called out. “Come over here and meet Josie and Molly and then we’re just waiting for one more.” She gestured broadly to the two women arranged around the table. 

“Hi! I come bearing gifts – a cappuccino for Josie, water and an herbal tea for Molly.” He set each drink down in front of them before circling back around. “And a double shot Americano for you, Olivia.” Hers he deposited with a flourish before taking his own seat between her and Molly to his right, opposite Josie on the left side of the table. 

“I’ve also got his favorite bubble tea for Widmark when he gets here.” Trevor gestured to the last drink left in the cardboard carrier, next to his own Dr Pepper. 

He looked up to see Olivia smiling, but the other two women in the room regarded him with suspicion. 

“That was sweet of you, Trevor. You should probably know, he goes by Mark now.” 

He dipped his head in acknowledgement. 

“Molly and Josie were just telling me that they’ve met before.” 

“Yeah,” Molly gave an awkward shrug. She considered the drinks in front of her, before appearing to decide they were trustworthy enough, and cracked open the sealed water bottle. “We both work for different branches of the same company. It just so happened that I was travelling for work last year and based at the other office for a bit.” 

“So then, at the annual holiday party,” Josie picked up the story from her seat across the table, “I made a very clumsy pass at her, and she shot me down, _hard_.” 

“I wasn’t sure what you were trying to do at first.” 

“I was trying to figure out if you were interested in women, you know, with a little plausible deniability,” Josie laughed. “I guess I was a little too subtle, since it took you so long to catch on.” 

“I was so dense, I only figured it out when she mentioned Tegan and Sara, and that was a clue even I couldn’t miss. By then, the only way I could think of to explain I was straight was to say that although I liked them, I didn’t have much in common with most of their fans.” Molly groaned and smothered her head in her hands. 

“Wow,” Trevor said with a raised eyebrow. He looked to Olivia, chuckling under her breath. 

“The worst part?” Josie asked. “The next girl I tried to hit on was straight too! I ended up making out with one of the guys from the Cincinatti office.” 

As the four of them laughed at the inauspicious first meeting of two of their members, the door swung open revealing their fifth and final team mate. 

“The door was open,” Mark Fowler announced from his position in the entry way. 

“Come on in!” Olivia hopped out of her chair and gestured to the open seat at the table. “Trevor even brought you some bubble tea. And Josie and Molly have met before; they work for the same company.” She pointed to each member of the team as she introduced them. 

Mark sketched a wave as he took his seat. 

“Now that everybody’s here, we can get started.” Something seemed to settle over Olivia. She was confident and commanding. Trevor imagined it served her well on the chess tournament circuit. 

“Cullen Technologies. Founded 1981, on the younger side for a publicly traded corporation, Their CEO is a man named Edgar Michaels; he’s been with the company for close to twenty years.” 

“My mother always told me you can never trust a man with two first names,” Mark interjected. He got a brief chuckle out of Trevor and Molly, before Olivia shot them a sharp look. 

“Among other things, Cullen produces a range of medical equipment. Except, what their medical division produces is not even close to industry standards. Something like 35% more people die when their equipment is used compared to other similar companies.” 

“You know, you don’t actually need to present this like a court case? Like, we get it, these guys are a little worse than your average corporation. I’m just here to take their money; you don’t have to paint them as Bond villains who kill puppies in their spare time.” Josie sat back and took another slow pull from her drink. 

Olivia huffed at the second interruption. 

“Maybe that’s true for you, but this is new for me,” she said, shortly. “I want to do this right. I brought all of you here because I really believe that Michaels needs to be stopped. What he’s been doing is – technically, barely – legal, but it is bad for the world.” Another shaky breath. “I need all of your help to do this.” 

“Olivia, wait; we’re here; we’re in,” Josie rushed to get out. “I didn’t mean that like it sounded. I just meant, we’re here to plan a crime, maybe let’s not paint everyone who commits any crime as a monster.” She finished with a sheepish shrug. 

“We might be planning a crime, but these guys are definitely worse than us. They’re not the only ones, but this is a good place to start. I can throw up all my research on their corporate structure, weak spots and like, on the big screen, if you want?” 

Olivia gestured for him to go ahead. 

“Well, alright.” Trevor tapped a few buttons on his phone and the screen at the front of the room lit up with a few charts and photos. 

“Since he took over Cullen, he's really taken charge of the medical division. He's the CEO, but he privately is a majority shareholder in an LLC which is a subcontractor that Cullen uses to manufacture their equipment.” 

“So he’s essentially paying himself to make the stuff?” Mark asked. 

“Really, it sounds like he pays himself, and the workmanship is so bad that people die,” Molly threw in. “I kind of want to break this guy’s nose just on principle.” 

“What about everybody else?” The rest of the group turned to look at Josie. She gestured broadly to encompass the information swimming along on the screen. “I mean, yeah, this Michaels guy is steering the ship, but it’s a multimillion dollar organization. He’s not doing everything on his own. Other people have to know; other people are participating.” 

Olivia takes a pause before responding. 

“You’re right. At least four other department heads know, and the management at the factory take orders from above. My hope is, when we get done, and the whole business lies in ruins, the FBI will be able to look at absolutely everything and really clean house.” 

“We’re trying to send them to the poor house, and then straight to jail, do not pass go, do not collect two hundred dollars – how are we actually supposed to do that?” Mark paused. “I’m really asking, I’ve never done anything like this before.” 

“If we’re being honest, neither have I,” Molly confessed. Trevor and Josie gave their own noncommittal shrugs, before all the eyes in the room turned to Olivia. She broke into a grin, spreading slowly across her face. 

“And that is where I come in. I have a plan.” 

*** *** *** *** *** 

Mark had been practicing responding to someone else’s name for the last few days. Everyone on the team had been instructed to call him Anthony, the name of his cover, while they were making their preparations. 

He was getting better at turning to look whenever one of the others called out to him – Anthony, Tony, Ant, and any other variation they could think of. 

So far, he was taking the approach of treating this like improv practice, only instead of “yes, and”-ing with a partner, the goal of this performance was to lead the other person to their own doom, all the while making them think it was their idea to begin with. 

He’d done his research for this role like it was any other. Once Olivia had outlined her plan and Trevor had mocked up the paperwork – place of origin, some professional background – Mark had set to work “fleshing out his character.” 

Anthony Treadwell didn’t have an accent, but he did have a linguistic style, phrases he liked to use often. Mark had even given him a way that he moved. 

All this was done in the service of making him more distinct, so no one who didn’t see him with their own eyes would even suspect that Anthony Treadwell and Mark Fowler were the same person. 

He’d learned in his time on stage that having some memorable details – the right costume piece or iconic line – actually made it harder for people to remember the details of your face. 

Today began a new phase of the job. He wasn’t even supposed to meet their “mark,” as he was told was the preferred lingo, yet. He was supposed to go out and meet other people in the business using his cover identity. The idea was that he didn’t appear to come out of nowhere. The mark would be more likely to trust him if he'd heard of Treadwell before they met. 

_Well, here goes nothing._

Mark stood up from his bench in the office park and made his way over to some likely-looking mid-level executives and began his life of crime. 

“Gentlemen, I'm Anthony Treadwell. I was hoping to come over and introduce myself.” 

*** *** *** *** *** 

Things were off to a great start. Olivia sat in front of the wall of screens Trevor had set up - after calling her own set up ‘cute’ - and watched Mark start to spread his name around. Trevor had been steadily plugging away at Cullen’s servers, after back stopping identities for all of them to use on this job. Molly and Josie had physically cased their central offices, and ever since, Josie had been practicing on the same model of safe where the ledger of bribes was most likely to be. 

So, things were moving along as expected, and Olivia was here with an eye on the big picture in case that changed. 

In another day or so of prep, it would be time to move into the next phase of the con. Olivia just hoped that her team was truly ready. 

*** *** *** *** *** 

He was going to need physical access. 

Trevor had used every tool in his arsenal against Cullen’s network, gained access to almost everything, but there was one final stronghold he couldn’t get into, and for that, he was going to actually have to be in the room. 

Despite his history of cracking into other people’s systems, up until this point, he’d never needed to leave his own place to do it. This was a whole new level. If he got caught, he’d really get caught, instead of just getting bounced out of the system and needing to replace his hardware. 

_But that’s why we work as a team._

In the next three minutes, Molly and Josie were coming to escort him from the lobby of the building to the depths of the server farm. All he had to do until then was hold still and not draw attention to himself. Since the invention of the smart phone, it was easier and easier to loiter but still look busy, and Trevor was taking full advantage. 

_There they are._

“Jim! It’s great to see you. Come here, have you met Laura?” Molly waved him over from across the lobby, gesturing to Josie as she used her cover identity. 

He crossed to the two of them and made idle chit chat until the front desk receptionist was out of hearing range. 

“You two are heading left down this corridor, then Josie’s getting you past the door.” Molly’s firm tone of command was miles away from the bubbly voice she was just using. “I’m keeping watch from right here, and with the guard rotation, you’ve got four minutes to meet me back here. If you miss your check in, I’m coming in after you. Do you understand?” 

She caught Trevor’s eyes, and then Josie’s, for a long moment, until she got two nods in reply. She jerked her head in their direction, then turned to watch the hallway. 

“Follow me,” he heard Josie whisper. 

He did as he was told, until they came to a door. By the time he’d turned to check the hallway behind them, Josie was opening the door with a smile on her face. 

“Six seconds, not bad,” she said. “People really ought to learn not to put doors like this, even locked ones, out in front of security checkpoints.” 

“I believe it was Napoleon Bonaparte who said 'Never interrupt your enemy when he is making a mistake'.” Trevor never passed up an opportunity for banter, even as they made their way into the bowels of the server room. 

“Nerd.” Josie huffed a laugh. “You’ve got two minutes, forty-five seconds.” 

Trevor nodded, then turned back to his keyboard. 

“Let me do what I do.” 

*** *** *** *** *** 

Edgar Michaels was having an odd sort of day. He’d been incredibly careful over the last number of years to keep everything he was doing above board. But today, a man named Treadwell had approached him. He was just starting out in the bio-tech industry, and wanted to get some insight from a veteran. He’d been perfectly pleasant, and he hadn’t said anything out right, but Edgar could read between the lines. 

The things he knew, the things he was saying – the only way anyone outside of the company could know any of it was if there was a leak. And if there was a leak, it was only a matter of time before whoever it was tried to steal from him or blackmail him. 

It was time to get out. He’d had a good run, but it was time to cover his tracks and cash out. He’d wrap up some business over the next few days, transfer everything he could get his hands on into his personal accounts, and be in the Cayman Islands by next week. 

He’d always known this couldn’t last forever, but he’d certainly made hay while the sun had shone. 

Everything was going to be fine. 

*** *** *** *** *** 

“Michaels is panicking,” Trevor announced from his seat in front of the array of computer screens. 

“Panicking how?” Olivia asked. 

“His conversation with Mark must have spooked him. He started moving funds from company accounts to his own personal ones.” 

“This is exactly what we wanted, right?” Mark asked. “He gets caught fleeing the country with a duffle bag of cash, then people look at the company for all the shady stuff, he gets carted off to jail?” 

“Except for the part where I wasn’t supposed to hit the safe until tomorrow!” Josie pointed out, throwing her arms in the air. 

“We still don’t know what’s in that ledger,” Molly added. “Or if there even is one, or that it’s in the safe. We need more time.” 

“Guys, it’s too early to panic.” Olivia’s voice held the same calm that had gotten them all on board in the first place. “Trevor, the trap you left in the servers sprung when he started moving funds, right?” 

He nodded, but looked back at his monitors to double check. 

“And he hasn’t bought any plane tickets?” 

Another nod. 

“So we’ve still got one more day to pull this off.” 

“If you really think he won’t be completely gone by morning,” Molly started, skepticism clear in her voice, “then he’ll definitely go to clear out the safe first thing. We need to get Josie there first, and we’ll need a distraction.” 

She was far from convinced that this job was anything but doomed at this point, but like hell was she going to give up before she’d done absolutely everything she could. 

“Trevor, keep an eye on him. We need to know the minute he leaves in the morning.” Olivia started rattling things off like a drill sergeant. It was impossible not to listen to a voice like that. 

“Molly, go sit on his place. Not too close, but you’ve got to be ready. You’re gonna stall him, and you won’t have long.” 

“Mark, you’re walking Josie right in the front door.” 

*** *** *** *** *** 

_Well, I guess I’m really going to jail now._

After hitting a woman with his car that morning, then offering her a hefty stack of cash to not call the police or tell anyone, Edgar Michaels had thought he’d gotten off easy, and he’d be able to clear out his office safe and be gone before anyone knew to look for him. 

Instead, he’d arrived at the office to find scores of cheaply-suited federal agents crawling over every inch of the building. He’d been politely but firmly taken into custody, and stashed in an office from which he’d watched everything he’d ever built picked apart and carted off in boxes. 

When he’d gotten started, he hadn’t been nearly so careful as he’d become in later years. With the records they’d seized so far, they’d be able to work backwards, find his earliest crimes, the bribes he hadn’t known enough to disguise. From there, everything else would come to light, and that would be the end of it. 

_I probably owe that Treadwell kid. He at least tried to warn me._

*** *** *** *** *** 

“It’s not as bad as it looks,” Molly insisted. 

“Well, it looks pretty bad,” Josie shot back. “You wanna play the tough guy, pretend you're fine, whatever, but at least let me fuss over you. It’ll make me feel better if nothing else.” 

“That may have been the coolest thing I have ever seen.” Trevor had almost fallen out of his chair when Molly had been kind-of-but-not-really-but-kind-of by the car. Now he was talking about it with awe in his voice. 

“It was nothing like any of the stage combat I've ever studied.” 

“The first thing you learn in most martial practices is how to take a fall. I really am fine.” She added the latter directly to Josie, her voice a little softer. 

“You did an incredible job stalling him. It was almost poetic – watching him make one last bribe on the day he finally got caught.” 

Olivia had been overflowing with praise ever since they’d all regrouped at what they’d started to refer to as headquarters. She'd gone on at length about Trevor’s masterful rerouting of funds and alerting the authorities, Josie’s record time with the safe, and Mark talking their way past security. 

This had consumed so much of her thoughts for so long. It was like a weight off to have it over and done. 

An hour ago, when her boss had called her to let her know that the old case that had been bothering her had just rocketed to the top of the to-do list, she'd struggled to keep her beaming smile out of her voice. With any luck, he’d chalk it up to her being glad someone had done it, instead of wildly proud that she herself had orchestrated the whole thing. 

“What I want to know is,” Trevor said, “when can we do it again? I know we need to let the dust settle, make sure there’s no blowback, but as soon as that’s done, I wanna get right back in the saddle.” 

“Wait a minute -” Olivia started. 

“For a job like this,” Josie cut her off, “I'd say our cool down period is at least three months. Up to six would be ideal, to really let the heat die down.” 

“Hold -” 

“Would it make a difference if we went to another city? If I get the job with the travel company, I'll be pretty mobile.” 

“I do need to get back to my regular life for a bit. I've missed a lot of training sessions as it is.” 

“Wait just a minute!” Olivia finally exclaimed. “What are you guys talking about.” 

“Isn’t it obvious?” Mark asked. “I never would have come up with it myself, but this was amazing. I've never worked so well with anybody than I have with you guys.” He looked around the room and gave each of them a brilliant smile. 

“I never really saw myself doing this either,” Molly added. “But I felt like I was putting something good into the world.” 

“It's a good feeling,” Josie agreed. 

“I know we all have our own things going on,” Trevor said, “but if we all had fun, and we all worked together so well, is there any reason we can’t get back together and do it all again a few times a year?” 

Olivia looked at each face in the room, turned towards her. If she said no, they really would take her cue and disband. 

But was that what she really wanted? 

_Hell no._

She broke into a grin. 

“You know, now that you mention it, I can think of some people who deserve to be separated from their wallets. And I know just the crew to do it.”

**Author's Note:**

> Well, that was it guys, my inaugural fanfic. Thank you for coming on this journey with me. Stay safe and be well.


End file.
